POBB October 3, 2018

Pick of the Brown Bag

October 3, 2018

by

Ray Tate

Welcome to the Pick of the Brown Bag.  My name is Ray Tate, and here at the POBB I review the best and the worst comics of the week.  For this post I peruse Batman, Iron Man, James Bond, The Lone Ranger, Nightwing and first subject Sparrowhawk.  Fresh condensed reviews can also be found on Twitter: #PickoftheBrownBag.

I'm always willing to give a first issue a try even when the genre's not really in my bailiwick.  What I'll usually do is flip through the book in the comic book shop and assess the artwork.  If the art's decent and the story doesn't appear wordy--often bad news--I'll take the debut home with me.  

Sparrowhawk's illustration by Matias Basla knocked me out.  So, that was half the battle.  The story though not at all wordy, looked to be pure fantasy.  Sparrowhawk surprised me.

The tale opens in 19th century Northumberland, England, and delves deep into death, illegitimacy, racism, peerage and marriage as a means to an end.  That's a wee bit more complex than most of the fairy tales I'm aware of.  Artemisia is at the center of this web of intrigue.  However, the death of her half-sister Elizabeth, not depicted, triggers the entirety.

At this point, we learn of a war waged between the Lady of the Manor and Artemisia.  It's a war besieging all fronts.  Lady Grey's real beef is that Artemisia is her husband's bastard child.  Her skin color and station helped Lady Grey hate Artemisia even more.  

At the same time, she must know that Artemisia is a young woman of rare character.  She knows that Artemisia will not let her other half-sister Caroline suffer a horrible fate.  She therefore hates Artemisia for another reason.  She knows Artemisia is a better person than she can ever hope to be.

This skirmish appears to favor Lady Grey.  Resigned to stewing in Lady Grey's trap, Artemisia prepares for the inevitable.  The faerie however take a hand in her destiny and throw her through the looking glass.

Usually children find their way to the lands of make believe.  Alice follows a hare.  Peter, Lucy, Susan and Edmond discover Narnia through the Wardrobe by accident.  The aggression of the faerie traveler is unique, and writer Delilah Dawson draws on the folklore of changelings for a decidedly fresh spin.

Once in Faerie, Artemisia must strike a bargain to learn of the rules.  This bargain seems like nothing, but it's in fact insidious and far darker than the actions Artemisia must later preform.  This includes fighting a giant and undergoing a strange, painful metamorphosis.  Recommended.

I aways liked Dick Grayson as Robin.  I never warmed to his ungrateful, wretched Nightwing.  The idea was that Robin grew up and grew out of his short pants.  So, he created a surlier identity based on the alter-ego Superman used when occasionally fighting crime in the bottled city of Kandor.  

The New 52 rebooted Nightwing along with every other DC character.  Kyle Higgins and Scott Snyder wrote Dick Grayson as the man I thought he always should have become.   Almost every hero and villain benefitted from the New 52.  Even Booster bloody Gold acquired his potential. 

In Forever Evil, scribe Geoff Johns exposed Dick Grayson's identity to the world.  So, Dick Grayson reinvented himself as spy in a series of adventures written by Tim Seeley.  The soft adjuster Rebirth excised the revelation scene.  So, Dick resumed his Nightwing sobriquet.  Since Rebirth, I've dipped in and out of Nightwing's title.  Mostly ending up with a shoulder shrug.  Perfectly okay but not notable.

The newest Nighting writer Benjamin Percy impressed me the most.  However, it's becoming increasingly apparent to the writers of the Batman Family titles that adherence to Tom King's continuity in Batman is vital for continued relevance.

As a result, Percy drops a lot of things that I liked in Nightwing.  Dark Web, the new enemy organization with a penchant for body horror, memory theft and hacking.  The mobile Batcave complete with motorcycle and crime lab gifted to him by Batgirl.  

His recent triumph on a mythical raceway and the acknowledgment he earned after about a million of years of being a sidekick.  These are the casualties of a radical, essentially new character created from the ashes of Tom King's latest Batman issue.  

You cannot even compare Nightwing’s transformation to regeneration.  A core Doctor, if you will, remains essentially the same, even should he become she. 

And she's fan-tas-tic!

The Doctor's memories also seem to be preserved.  For example, the third Doctor’s love and memories of his companion Sarah Jane remain intact throughout the regenerative cycle.  Nightwing may possess a few old memories, but those memories lack emotional connections.  Nightwing for example does not remember Barbara Gordon.  

Batgirl's Blue Eyes courtesy of Nick Filardi

That scream of anguish echoing in the distance emits from the scores of Dick Grayson/Barbara Gordon shippers that were never going to get their fondest desires anyhow.  I've spoken in previous reviews of how DC fomented the concept.  I never liked the idea of anything beyond friendship between Nightwing and Batgirl.  Dick Grayson's mental fog doesn't really make me happy.  I'm not celebrating a final stake in that particular heart.  Rather, it's another shoulder shrug.

This is a new character almost coincidentally named Dick Grayson.  So, I’m going to examine his characterization as if he weren’t named Dick Grayson.  Indeed, he seems to prefer any variation of the monicker.

Nevertheless, to preclude confusion, I'll still refer to him as Dick Grayson.  Dick is basically a street level operator with an alarming lack of identity.  He doesn’t have a home.  Instead, he borrows other peoples’ abodes for a night or two.  He does though pay them for any inconvenience.

DIck takes on work as a cab driver.  He engages in fight club type brawls for money.  He hustles pool, and he basically attempts to survive any way he can in a somewhat nomadic existence.  Though he still sticks to the Bludhaven and Gotham City districts.  At least for now.

Dick Grayson does nothing to arouse any emotion in the reader other than to stop a holdup at a diner.  

That's pretty low-res for a second tier super-hero.  Nightwing is all setup, but there’s still some interest for the discerning reader.  Dick's downturn draws the Batman Family together.

They do not abandon Dick Grayson.  In fact, Batman follows him presumably throughout this new journey.

Essentially, Batman is Dick's Dad making sure his boy is okay on his first day of school.  I've always surmised that Batgirl often visited the Batcave for intel or just to discuss the latest crimefighting technology with Batman, over tea and scones.  That said.  This is probably the most Batgirl's been seen in the Batcave since Batman Eternal.

On the flip side, it amused me greatly that Dick Grayson’s new environment is filled with things that are in the Black Label debacle The Damned.  Here I thought you could only proudly present a XXX theater in a Black Label book.  Apparently not.

In fact, Nightwing has more of an adult feel to it.  Not because Thomas Wayne is diddling somebody on the side maybe or because of Batman's circumcised co-star.  Nightwing addresses brain trauma after severe injury.  That's a tough conversation to have with an adult let alone a child.  

Facilitating the better representation of maturity, the artwork by Chris Moonyham and Filardi takes a realistic upswing to lend verisimilitude to the situation.  Overall Nightwing is a superior book when compared to The Damned, but I don't really think it surpasses Benjamin Percy's opening gambit.  It's just different.

A lot of people think that Batman is about revenge, but even when he snapped necks with a song in his heart, Batman wasn't seeking vengeance for his murdered parents.  He never thought Dr. Death or Professor Hugo Strange killed his parents.  He pursued the criminal element because he vowed nobody else would suffer like he did.

It is for that reason he adopted Dick Grayson.  This latest issue of Batman on the other hand is about revenge.  Plain and simple.  

Even Alfred wants a taste.  Last time the KGBeast of all creatures took something precious from Batman.  Batman simply wants to capture the Beast, beat him senseless and maybe even kill the son-of-a-bitch.  Nobody can fault Batman if he slipped this once.  I don't think it will happen, but you never know.  

Because Batman doesn't play out in a vacuum, this is a revenge story like no other.  It's a revenge story set in the DCU.  In addition to terrorizing a gun dealer, Batman seeks out leads from old comrades and old enemies.  In one hilarious moment, Batman threatens an old-school alien.

Frankly, despite my respect for Jims Aparo and Starlin, I never thought the KGBeast was a big deal.  Batman defeats him in a mini-series and imprisons him beneath Gotham City.  Naturally he escapes, but I don't believe that was his creators' intent.  That he made it to a Tom King Batman is surprising.

The Lone Ranger returns to comics with writer Mark Russell and James Bond artist Bob Q.  The creative team reintroduce the Ranger and later Tonto through the theme of historical civil unrest in the 19th century.

The Fence Cutting Wars began as a conflict between sheep herders and cattlemen.  A direct affront to the concept of the open range, the conflict emerged as a result of greed, bigotry and the abuse of the Homestead Act of 1862.  The Act was meant to benefit any person who didn’t “take up arms against the United States.”  Progressively that included women and former slaves.

All such populations could apply for a federal land grant, but cattle barons soon took advantage.  They began to mark territory with barbed wire.  The land frequently stolen from independent farmers and/or sheep herders.  

In the debut of The Lone Ranger, the ranchers wage the war against each other.  No doubt because the victim believed and abided by the law.

Russell’s sturdy plot gets a boost by his characterization of the fiendish cattle barons.  Racist and rotten to the core, they’re the picture of period Southern Democrats.  Basically, the Democratic Party used to be The Republican Party and visa versa.  Modern democrats would not be recognizable until the FDR era.

All well and good but what about the Lone Ranger.  What’s his part in all of this, and does Russell do a good job presenting him?

Dynamite introduced a well received Lone Ranger series that “modernized” the Ranger and Tonto without taking the weird western route that Joe R. Lansdale did for DC Comics.  Neither was a bad series but each lacked something.

Russell happily does not dwell too much time on the Ranger’s origin, which everybody hopefully knows.  He makes some interesting tweaks.  He demonstrates that the Ranger is what he is because he is a dead man reborn.

Russell further displays the Ranger's acumen and his stealth.  The Ranger is quiet.  Sneaking up on henchmen.  Spying on the villains while he gets the facts.  When exposed showing off his marksmanship and his partnership with Silver, brought to life by Q.

The second issue of James Bond Origin is more comedic and lighter in tone than the premiere.  That's due to the well executed trope of the British SAS drill sergeant that insults his charges and makes their lives miserable in the process of training.  

Jeff Parker's wit fashions these insults and situations in such a way that it's impossible to hold back.  I found myself laughing aloud frequently.  

Sergeant Sayles is a hilarious over the top creation that's probably a believe-it-or-not accurate assessment of the World War II drillers.  He's a true sadist, and proud of the fact.

Sayles' goal is to break each and every recruit.  Several wash out.  Nascent Bond is still Bond, and Parker parallels young Bond with Captain Kirk.  He pulls a Kobayashi Maru that's brilliant and funny.

In addition to breaking-in-training hell, Bond learns electronics and chemistry.  Parker also proves that he's a cunning linguist, and it's here that Bond exudes his remarkable charisma.

He does not lose his virginity here.  Bond loses his virginity at age sixteen in Paris as reported in Ian Fleming's "A View to a Kill."  Gospel.  These amusing achievements hang on the framework of a mole hunt, and that too is interesting.

Ah, yes the famous Wasp/Tony Stark thing.  That I've never heard of.  

I have it on good authority that if I see something in Iron Man that I don't recognize as being canon, I should simply chalk it up to Brian Bendis, the previous show runner, curse him and move on.   

Dan Slott reshapes badness into something good.  For example, Tony Stark's birth-mother is apparently a female version of the late, great David Bowie.

I probably would have hated this retcon had I read it in a Bendis book, but Slott and Valerio Schiti make Amanda Armstrong so darn likable. 

Tony and Janet dated and want to rekindle the romance.  Okay.  I accept that and move on.  Besides, in no way shape or form should Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne get back together.

The Marvel cinematic universe is a much brighter, happier place.  That version of Hank and Janet Pym, everybody roots for.  Rightfully so.  

On the flip-side, everybody knows about Hank Pym's and the Wasp's tragic history together and his even more bizarre co-dependency with his creation Ultron.  

Still, a Wasp and Iron Man union should feel a little uncomfortable, even if they're unrelated.  Even if they've only known each other six years Marvel-sliding-scale time and not the historical seventy. 

Slott presents their commonalities as Valerio Schiti makes them a charming couple and action-ready dynamic duo.  This bounce negates any potential discomfort.

Jocasta's confirmation is our confirmation about the validity of Tony's romance with the Wasp.  What's also fascinating about the scene is that Slott and Schiti characterize Janet as a remarkably warm, kind person.

In one of Hank Pym's worst moments, he brainwashed Iron Man to kidnap the Wasp and turn her over to Ultron.  Hank and Ultron worked in concert to build Ultron a mate, Jocasta.  Hank then nearly killed his then wife by transferring Jan's brain patterns to Jocasta.

So, in summary, Janet is dating her former kidnaper, because guess what? It wasn't his fault, but how many people would be so forgiving? 

She's being absolutely chirpy while in the presence of Jocasta, the being she was forced to animate.  Not Jocasta's fault, and yet...In fact, Wasp early on embraced Jocasta. 

In the Unstoppable Wasp, Janet actually adopts Hank's child from his previous marriage.  The second wasp Nadia Van Dyne.  

Janet is without a doubt the most ethical person in the Marvel Universe, and because of that you want she and Tony to be happy.

Oh, you seek a plot as well? Okay.  So, high stakes industrial espionage from the loopy Tony Stark foil Slott and Schiti introduced a few issues ago.  Complete with attack killer robots and an application of Jocasta's roboethics forcing a non-violent solution.  The book is so upbeat that the answer comes in the form of a pun extrapolated to the eleven.

POBB August 15, 2018

Pick of the Brown Bag

August 15, 2018

by

Ray Tate

Shazam! It’s the Pick of the Brown Bag with reviews of the latest issues of Aquaman, Batgirl, Batman, Infinity 8, Iron Man, Relay, Stellar and Thor.  First a look at the newest graphic series from Titan and Hard Case Crime Lis Salander in The Girl Who Danced with Death.  No time for the blog, check out the tweets: #PickoftheBrownBag.

In short, wow!

The publishers of Stieg Larrson’s Millennium trilogy restarted the series with another author.  I attempted to read The Girl in the Spider’s Web by David Lagercrantz, but found it to be a dull affair.  A slow burn that fizzled.  It had a few decent action set-pieces but nothing interesting built around them.  The Girl Who Danced with Death is quite the opposite.

An indictment of the rising darkness of racism and jingoism, Sylvain Runberg’s story also tackles invasion of privacy and of course misogyny.  These topics fuel the original three books of the Millennium trilogy.  The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was in fact originally known in Sweden as Men Who Hate Women.

Runberg begins with a simple concert.  Lisbeth, Trinity and Trinity’s boyfriend Bob the Dog seek to enjoy the music of Evil Finger.  

Heroes seldom get vacations or even moments to themselves.  Lisbeth Salander is no different in that respect.  A group of masked men attempt to kidnap she and her friends.  An extraordinary dumb move.

If you never had the pleasure of encountering Lisbeth Salander in the novels or the movies, you can digest the basics about her in this scene.  

Lisbeth Salander is one of the fiercest women ever created.  Like Sherlock Holmes before her, the imagery of her character suggests a living being and not a literary figure.

The Swedish legal system essentially treated Lis like a Hacky Sack.  For that reason, Lis at first suspects the SÄPO, Sweden’s Special security force.  Under the impression, Lis decides to break SÄPO’s NSA-like data collection system.  

Simultaneously, Mikael Blomkvist investigates the latest Nazi attempting to secure power in Sweden.  At a rally that could be unfortunately set anywhere in the civilized world, Mikael corners Sten Windoff.

You can see by the brilliantly illustrated hungry look that Windoff believes he has the upper hand.  He intends to use Blomkvist and Millennium to his advantage.

Under normal circumstances, he may have succeeded.  What Windoff cannot predict is Wasp, Lisbeth Salander.

Lisbeth provides Mikael with information about former Nazi activity tied into Windoff.  Oh, and by the way, I’m sure that groups like Christian Identity and the White Wifflepoofs prefer their chosen monickers.  Fuck ‘em.  They’re Nazis.

Lisbeth’s discoveries give Mikael a great lead.  Runberg demonstrates with Goran Virson that not every person is irredeemable, and not every man is a prick.  Although as depicted in the original Millennium series, there are quite a few irredeemable pricks out there.

One of the stranger Nazi movements is the whining white male brigade that blames all their troubles on women.  They feel that—ha-ha—women have too much and this perceived power dilutes their testosterone.  The species of violent cretins would have been perfect fodder for Stieg Larsson.  Runberg is quick to pick up on this social abomination.

Sparta another hate group that may or may not be tied into the polished Nazis running for political office.  Sparta seek to break SÄPO for different reasons and hoped to force Lisbeth Salander into working for them.  This would be dumb move number two.  

Let me just say that when Lis takes out the many forms of trash in this first chapter, I actually grew teary.  Seriously.  I almost wept for joy.

That’s the plot without spoilers.  This breakdown doesn’t begin to uncover the intricacies of the details associated with the Millennium trilogy, the smashing dialogue that suits each character, the new characters that fit snugly within the more familiar group, the development of the faces we know, and the nuanced relationships between the major and minor cast members.  

Artist Belen Ortega elegantly and aesthetically translates the Millennium trilogy’s descriptors into an exciting visual narrative.  Sylvain Runberg’s translator Rachel Zerner must be commended for a lean-cut that mimics the delivery of Stieg Larrson.  In short, this first issue of The Girl Who Danced With Death is a perfect sequel.

There’s a line in Doctor Who where the Doctor says to River Song “I’m a time traveler.  I point and laugh at archaeologists.”

This describes the Nazi revolution on the Infinity 8.  Archaeologists must have gotten the Nazi movement all wrong because the Nazi Club—essentially a chess club with swastikas—offer a philosophy of peace, love and open their doors to all, including aliens.  They even bake friendship cakes.  Clearly, the archaeologists completely botched their discoveries.

The Infinity 8 is a star-cruiser run by an alien captain whose race can reboot time.  For this reason, the Captain sends his finely built female agents to investigate, participate and observe the time stream.  

That wasn’t the intent for this accidental disaster.  He ordered Agent Moonkicker only to provide security for the Nazis on board.  It should have been an easy assignment.

In the previous log entry, the Infinity 8 encountered a debris field that catalyzed a host of problems.  Rebooting the time stream allowed the Captain to avoid these issues, but time recapitulated.  The Infinity 8 flew into a new debris field, and this one presented an interesting find for the Nazis and Agent Moonkicker.  They saved Hitler’s Head!

Although this premise is utterly preposterous, writer Lewis Trondheim and artist Olivier Vatine take the condition seriously.  As consequence Infinity 8 becomes a tale of extreme horror.

Hitler’s words are chilling, and it doesn’t matter that the story takes place in a cosmopolitan universe filled with alien life.  The point is that if Hitler survived and somehow updated himself, he would tailor his vision to fit the facts.  

Nevertheless promoting a philosophy of hate that allows him to kill innocent beings.  Because that’s what the original Nazis were.  Politically installed serial killers.

Trondheim and Vatine also demonstrate that Hitler’s intended takeover of the ship is facilitated by complacency.  Hitler’s philosophy clashes with the new Nazi chess club.  They witness his atrocities and do nothing.  The LGBT community stupidly welcomes Hitler and the new Nazi regime only to be slaughtered for their misplaced kindness.  

The moral of the story is very simple and written by Quentin Tarantino.  “You only need to hang mean bastards, but mean bastards need to hang.”  In this case, hang it like a piñata.

The Relay is a monolith of unknown origin that demands fealty and fidelity.  It’s a malevolent dictator that provides freedom for a price.  The Relay operates with the help of a police force similar to the Sandmen of Logan’s Run.  

The Relay seeks to expand its planetary empire, and to that effect offers planet’s a simple choice: join or be exterminated.  

Legend has it that a man named Hank Donaldson created the Relay.  The current mythological trek is to find Donaldson’s World, and Donaldson himself.  The explorers/policemen in the second issue find him, sort of.

The world they arrive on is Star Trek the Original Series raised to the Nth power.  Instead of visiting planets that mimic Nazi Germany--"Patterns of Force"--or the Native American era--"Paradise Syndrome," they find Donald's World to be a hodgepodge of different time apery per city and town.

They reach Donaldson himself.  All seems delightful, but soon philosophical conflict arises via Sergio Leone styled closeups.

In the end, Jad fails to convince Donaldson of his folly.  He tries to buy time.

Is Jad our hero? If so, he’s completely ineffectual.  Albeit due to an interstellar collusion ingrained in every citizen following the Relay.  Of course, Donaldson's World isn't quite what it appears.  So, perhaps the reader's loyalty to the innocent bystander is misplaced in this case.

For more pulpy styled science fiction, check out Stellar by Joseph Keatinge and Brett Blevins.  Stellar is the name of the female protagonist.  She wouldn’t call herself a hero.  Aliens changed her DNA to grant her great power for the benefit of war.  Think of Stellar as an alternate take, a very alternate take, on Captain Marvel. 

Keatinge and Blevins slowly introduced Stellar as a merciful bounty hunter.  This was the only way for Stellar to survive when she left the war.  Nobody however likes a deserter.

A battle against her former teammates marooned Stellar on a ruined planet.  After defeating them, she finds monstrous lifeforms and one Basselope treasure.

Stellar’s new look denotes the time she spent on the world.  The creative team inventively show the passage of time through the lifespan of Stellar’s new four legged friend.  This occurs economically on one page.

It turns out that the Big Bad Zenith never gave up looking for Stellar.  Stellar however is willing to deal.  She just wants off the planet and to be left alone.  Fat chance.

Thematically, Stellar is an anti-war book.  Throughout the entirety, Keatinge and Blevins show the costs of war.  Stellar’s bounty hunting introduction is a far from a desirable occupation.  After an accidental encounter, she helps set up a sanctuary for war orphans.  She’s plagued by memories of war-crimes.  The war is everlasting, and it's metastatic.

Though she attempts peaceful co-existence, nobody seems to want it, and she’s forced to fight.  Stellar’s overt appeal is the presence of an intergalactic chick that kicks ass, and the book’s depth comes from the message.

New Batgirl writer Mairghread Scott introduces herself with two stories in an anthology of Batgirl stories.  Scott’s second tale is a straight up crime story with terrific artist Paul Pelletier set up as her accomplice.   Batgirl uses her eidetic memory superbly to uncover an old nemesis up to his old murderous tricks.

The fight’s exciting and the crime is far removed from the safety of Burnside’s near all-ages buffet of misdemeanors and technological wonderland of felony.

In Scott’s opener, she ties Batgirl into Tom King’s Batman continuity in a unique way.  Don’t worry if you, for some stupid reason, haven’t read King’s Batman.  This story and review won’t spoil much.

The tale vacillates between past and present, live and dead.  The mother of a victim challenges Batgirl’s personal philosophy.

She also assuages the troubled vigilante in a sweet way that repays Batgirl for saving her son.  However briefly.

Batgirl’s disturbance feeds into Tom King’s future series Sanctuary.  Scott quietly examines an unexplored area in the superhero psyche.  What happens when the hero in the long run fails?

I grew up reading comic books in the Bronze Age.  For that reason, I am not a Dick Grayson/Barbara Gordon shipper.  Dick admitted to being in love with Batgirl, sound asleep at the time, but Babs didn’t reciprocate.  When toying with the idea in a moment of fancy, she concluded the concept ludicrous.  That’s because she was at least five years older than Dick Grayson and a Congresswoman.  Dick still attended Hudson University.

That said.  I sometimes feel sorry for the shippers.  You suckers fell for a trap DC created in the Post-Crisis.  The Powers that Be reduced Barbara’s age, threw Dick Grayson into her past and—here’s the important part—introduced her crippled.  Disabled people can have sex, but I doubt the Powers That Be at DC knew that.  I'm sure they thought Babs had to be chaste now.  The horribly underrated Birds of Prey television series progressively thought differently.

It's a case of having your cake and eating it.  Any Batgirl adventure happened in flashback.  If Dick courted Batgirl or visa versa it was part of the tragic romance cut short by the Joker's bullet.  Happily, this wouldn't affect Dick getting his jollies off in the present day with every cape and cowled woman in the DCU.  Barring Wonder Woman and Thorn who had taste.  As well as Supergirl who didn't make the cut to be resurrected the first time around.  Barbara's most intimate relationship in the post-Crisis was with Black Canary and that was ear-sex.  Ah, double standards.

Batman being Batman however made the point moot.  It took twenty-five years and a second complete cosmic reboot, but Batman brought the technology from South Africa.  Babs can walk again.  She immediately resumed her career as Batgirl.  Nightwing in the New 52 an older brother figure.  Batgirl the younger sister.  Neither seemed interested in the other.  That anguished cry you heard? Shippers seeing their dreams dashed upon the rocks of despair.

So, after Rebirth, Babs and Dick are on a level playing field. They seem to be curious about each other.  As you can see, in this alleged “Anniversary Issue” of Batgirl they finally, finally do it.  

Nah.  

That's not post-coital bliss.  That’s the image you see when you turn to the Urban Dictionary and look under the term Friend Zone.  What says friends more than sleeping together without screwing?

What’s shocking is how sex-positive writer Marguerite Bennett manages to stretch one simple sentence, “I might let you fuck me one day, far away, in the future, but not tonight” into five pages of bad rom-com dialogue.  Challenge not met.

I like Scott's tales.  Bennett's story is utterly awful to anybody but a shipper.  The best short though comes from Paul Dini's word processor.  Dini takes the Harley Quinn template that he created and produces March Harriet.

Apparently, she and Batgirl met before, or Harriet knows her by reputation.  In any case, this is Harriet's story.  She's strangely set herself up to be captured by Batgirl, specifically.  So, I like that Batgirl is needed in this tale to make it work.  Arguably, Batman would have been just as sympathetic, but to a villain, Batgirl is approachable.  She seldom tries to terrify you.

Harriet's story is remarkable for a number of reasons.  She's not a murderer.  She could have killed Batgirl but chooses instead to wake her up.  She also doesn't violate her secret identity.  She needs her to listen and wants an appreciative audience.  She also wants her victim to suffer as much as possible and she likes games.  Batgirl is a superior player.

Harley Quinn didn't start out as bisexual, or as obsessively in love with the Joker.  As Batman the Animated Series progressed and became more successful, Dini and Bruce Timm developed her sexuality.  Here, Dini introduces March Harriet as a lesbian.  This is very important for a number of reasons.  It explains Harriet's motives.  It more importantly explains her association with Jervis Tech, the Mad Hatter.  Why he would sympathize with her and save her from Gotham's icy waters.  She's just as much of an outsider as he.  That in turn explains why she dresses like the March Hare and joins his spree.  It also explains why he would never treat her like an object, an Alice despite her blonde hair and instead see her as a valued comrade in crime.  

Harriet's need to confess is a little more inexplicable until the ending unfolds, all in Emanuela Lapacchino's inviting artwork.  When Batgirl assures Harriet that the man who wronged her will pay for his crimes, she's grateful.  She wants all of his crimes to be exposed.  She wants all of his life behind his legitimate facade uncovered, and she knew Batgirl was the person to do it.  She can also have fun in the process and extract a modicum of personal vengeance.  March Harriet is an excellent foil for Batgirl, and I hope she and Dini return.

Tom King confounds the reader again, but in a good way.  So, here’s the timeline.  Three women turn up dead.  The Gotham City Medical Examiner rules for natural causes.  The cases attract Batman.  He determines all the women displayed an increase in body temperature before they died.  Batman deduces that Mr. Freeze must be behind the murders.  

Batman brings a severe beat down on Mr. Freeze.  Even he's shocked by the level of violence he delivers.  Still, bad guy caught, right? Except there’s a problem.  Commissioner Gordon’s people aren’t bunglers.  So, why didn’t the medical examiner detect the temperature increases in the bodies? Somebody is framing Mr. Freeze.  

Batman horrified that he may have sent an innocent man to the gas chamber or Arkham, joins the jury as Bruce Wayne and must persuade the jurors to free Mr. Freeze.

The story began as a legal drama/police procedural.  The second chapter introduced an element of mystery.  Who framed Mr. Freeze? Did anybody?

This third chapter becomes a philosophical discussion about Batman.  What is he? 

Tom King likes Batman and his affection for the character shows in every awesome moment he creates.  I’d be hard pressed to say that about a lot, a lot of post-Crisis writers.  They liked to portray Batman as unfeeling.  In King’s run of Batman, Bruce feels too much.  He tries to make the world a better place through his intellect and his fists.  His object is equivalent to Superman.  He's there to save lives.  Not make them worse.

King demonstrates that hope through the jurors themselves.  Their faith in Batman is borne from the fact that he saved the majority’s lives.  King seemed to be creating a situation where Bruce must break that faith in Batman, but in fact, Bruce is down on his knees, begging for the jurors to see beyond the mystique and identify the man.  It’s a fascinating and original treatise, beyond deconstruction and emphasized through the symbolism and montage of artist Lee Weeks.

Iron Man crackles with fun.  Tony Stark introduces an immersive VR system to the world.  Here, you are Iron Man, and you can use various skins to enter various worlds.

There’s a spy in the house of love, and his name is Aaron Stack, the Machine Man.  Don’t worry, this isn’t much of a spoiler because writer Dan Slott has an even better surprise at the conclusion.

Along the way, he uses the Nextwave characterization of Machine Man as a springboard to create nemesis.  Nobody really takes this guy seriously.  Slott treats him like the prickly loser that he is.  This only adds to the hilarity and travels the fun road to a kind ending.

When Jane Foster left the hammer behind, I thought for sure that I'd give up Thor along with her.  The fact is that I've never been a Thor guy.  My past involvement with the character is due to the art or some of the guest stars.  Chris Hemsworth and the Marvel cinematic universe is the best thing to happen to Thor.  The want to give Thor a sense of humor as well as embody a genuine Thunder God charges life into this otherwise traditionally staid hero.  Writer Jason Aaron imbues that fitting comic element to his latest issue of Thor.

Niffelheim is the Realm of the Dead, once ruled by Hela, daughter of Loki, niece to Thor.  Now presided by Balder the Brave.  Killed by Mistletoe.  

Thor, Loki, Tyr and Balder eliminated a Fire Goblin engine that contained a weapon of mass destruction.  Turns out, it was Hela, and she and her brother Fenris attempted to dethrone Balder with prejudice.  Loki struck a solution to the infighting.  Balder will marry Hela over the objections of Balder's true love the deceased Norn Queen Karnilla.  Fire Goblins and their Queen unfortunately crash the wedding.

At this crossroads, The Queen of Cinders attacks in the name of Malekith and her unholy alliance.  The Nine Realms still war.  Unbeknownst to the Queen, Loki killed Thor to send him to Valhalla.  All in a ploy to recruit Valkyries.

I expected this to be a difficult task, some sort of clause in the Valkyries code of conduct I thought would prevent them from partaking.  Aaron surprises with ease.  Valhalla and the Valkyries are simply so far removed that they didn't know about the War.  They're only too happy to fight and turn the tide.  This involvement of women warriors is only one of the ways Aaron reinforces the message left behind by Jane Foster's wielding of Mjonlir.  

While Thor and the Valkyries return to Niffleheim, Loki and the others wage battle against the Queen of Cinders and her Fire Goblins.  On a visceral level, the fight is most satisfying as is Loki's commentary.  However, the biggest surprise comes in two: a momentous breakup and the resumption of the wedding.  

Introducing Mera's reign as Queen of Atlantis.  Dan Abnett with Rob Williams present the second part of the Aquaman/Suicide Squad crossover.  

Not being a fan of the Suicide Squad, I passed on the first chapter.  Indeed, Queen Mera's coronation is the major draw for that issue, but the ceremony occurs at the very end.  So, Aquaman fans can wait until Suicide Squad comes down in price or bite the bullet if they're so in need of seeing the pomp and circumstance.

You may rightfully ask what necessitates the Suicide Squad's infiltration of Atlantis.  Mera would like to know that as well.  Aquaman just wants to beat the crap out of them and eject them from Atlantis.

A wise decision.  Amanda Waller tasked the Suicide Squad to blow up Atlantis with a magical bomb provided by former Superman foe Satanis.  Satanis was a pretty big cheese in the Superman mythology.  How the mighty have fallen.

In repelling the invaders under Mera's nose, Aquaman accidentally secures a role for he, Dolphin and the rest of the Ninth.

Mera does things as Queen that Arthur would never do as King.  That's because Mera is more practical than Aquaman.  She follows a different moral code than Arthur's more heroic creed.

Joe Bennett, Vincent Cifuentes and Adriano Lucas are the perfect additions to Aquaman.  Bennett once thought of as merely a babe artist proved his mettle on The Immortal Hulk, and in Aquaman we get to see him expand his oeuvre.  Not just illustrating fisticuffs, he also visually depicts Mera and Arthur finding a balance between royalty, love and purpose.  Aquaman is a Bennett high point.